Liberating Mankind From the Comfort of My Bedroom

A Few English Lessons

So. *taps mic* Is this thing on?

I haven’t posted for a VERY long time (considering the fact that I am drastically failing at my goal to post at least one thing everyday) and so I feel the need to; especially seeing as this blog is mostly my way of talking to somebody (i.e. you) other than my friends and family who probably get sick of hearing me talk at them all. The. Time.

Anyways, before I start the ACTUAL blog post. This week (hopefully) will be a nerd-filled, jam-packed week of geeky excitement. Myself, the Astellians (all bar Sazza and my little sis) and the Elms Squad are going to turn into a bunch of tourists; we are visiting nearly every single *coughs* FREE *coughs* museum in London. It was literally a matter of Susanna and I sitting down and saying: “We have a week free. We have 10+ museums to visit, so we need to get to at least 2 everyday.”

I even made an itinerary and everything. (Is that even the right thing? An itinerary?) So that should be absolutely fabulous.

Right, back on track now. So. I’ve probably mentioned before – or you may have even noticed – that I am a stickler when it comes to punctuation and grammar; and very little stresses me out as much as the lack or the misuse thereof.

As briefly as I can in one short evening post, I am going to just highlight some common mistakes, how to rectify them, and then throw in some of those rules. (Because EVERYONE loves English grammar rules!) I’d just like to add a disclaimer: I am not an English scholar. I repeat, I am not an English scholar. I AM, however, a teenager who very much appreciates the correct usage of the Standard English Language and I feel like we need to learn to speak correctly as a generation, to be honest.

I’m rambling again. Anyways. If you’re reading this and you’re American, you may think, “Hey, she is adding a lot of ‘u’s where there don’t need to be any!” Well, let me just tell you: if I read your blog, I am thinking “Hey, he/she has removed all of those ‘u’s which upsets me very much!”

But hey. Common dialects, right?

1. YOUR and YOU’RE

The Queen’s Explanation:YOUR is used in reference to a person’s possession, either of object or character. (i.e. A characteristic or possession, both physical and metaphysical; like emotions)

You cannot use YOUR when you are DESCRIBING what a person is doing or what they are!

e.g. YOUR amazing (though it is true of me, it doesn’t make grammatical sense), YOUR ugly (there are two errors in this example anyway… I am not ugly, and you are using the incorrect word), YOUR winding me up, YOUR boring, etc.

Key Point:YOU’RE is a contraction of “You are”. When you say YOU’RE, you’re saying YOU ARE. So if you replace the word YOU’RE in the sentence with YOU ARE and it doesn’t make sense… YOU ARE using it incorrectly! (See what I did there? Hee hee!)

e.g. YOU’RE fantastic = YOU ARE fantastic (Correct in BOTH senses!)

YOU’RE coat is very nice = YOU ARE coat is very nice (Incorrect!)

KEY POINT: Just don’t get it wrong in conversation with me.

2. THERE, THEY’RE and THEIR

The Queen’s Explanation: THEREis used when you are talking about a place. Let’s combine this concept with point number 1:

e.g. YOUR coat is over THERE, so YOU’RE going over THERE

THEY’RE is a contraction of THEY and ARE (similar to YOU’RE – YOU ARE). You use THEY’RE when you are describing the actions or characteristics of a group of people.

e.g. THEY’RE going over THERE(The same principle applies here; replace it with THEY ARE and if the sentence still makes sense then it is correct!) THEY ARE going over THERE.

THEIRis used when you are attributing a physical or metaphysical possession to a group of people.

e.g. THEIRcoats are over THERE…THEY’RE going over THEREto get THEIRcoats.

Confused yet? YOU ARE? (WOW… I did it again.) Okay good.

3. WHERE and WERE

This one is a lot simpler than the other two concepts.

The Queen’s Explanation: WHEREis in reference to a place or destination. (e.g. WHEREare THEIR coats? THEIR coats are in your wardrobe, WHERE YOU’RE keeping them…)

WERE(by my understanding at least, I hope this is correct) is simply the past tense particle of the verb ‘to Be’ (Long story, so let’s not get into how that works… it’s an irregular verb, okay?)

e.g. WERETHEIR coats over here? No, THEY’RE over THERE. WHEREare they? THEY’RE with THEIR coats. (I’m not sure why I have a sudden obsession with coats, but for some reason, that’s the only example I seem to remember from all these books about correct grammar and punctuation!)

Key Point: You cannot use WEREin reference to a place.

A good way of remembering THERE and WHEREis that the former can be a direct answer to the latter:

WHERE? THERE.

Whereas WEREcannot be used as a response to THERE…

I hope this is not getting out of hand now. Only a few more things to clarify now!

4. Using Apostrophes ( ‘ )

The Queen’s Explanation: Apostrophes are not natural disasters. They can be used as means of contractions (not like the ‘giving birth’, ‘dilation’ type contractions; but the ‘shortening word’ contractions) or also to show possession. I am going to try and keep it as simple as possible, because it can get VERY technical.

CAN’T (cannot), DON’T (do not), WON’T (will not), COULDN’T (could not) and WOULDN’T (would not) are all standard examples of using apostrophes for contractions. The use of this ‘ shows that the user has intentionally missed out letters and is replacing those missing letters appropriately by alerting any reader to the fact that they have purposely omitted these.

SARAH’S doing something she SHOULDN’T be; she just CAN’T help herself = Sarah IS doing something she SHOULDNOT be; she just CANNOT help herself. (Meeting up with Lampton boys… just some Astellian banter there)

Using apostrophes to show possession is simple: you use their name or identifying tag and then add an ‘s’ after the apostrophe:

e.g. The CHILD’S pen. The apostrophe highlights to the reader that the pen belongs to the child.

MATTHEW’S family. (Whose family are they? THEY’RE Matthew’s family.)

Now here comes the plot twist. It has always been taught that when someone’s name ends in an S, you cannot apply this principle (adding ‘ ‘s ‘), but actually, that is incorrect. You are allowed to do that… and it is in fact, grammatically correct.

e.g. JAMES’S car – this is actually correct. This is because there is only ONE James.

IF however, the FAMILY is called the JAMES family, only THEN do you add an apostrophe by itself:

e.g. The JAMES’ car.

If I don’t stop now I am very much convinced that this will turn into some sort of online teaching seminar: How To Use English 101. I think I will end with two commonly-taught rules; both of which are absolute RUBBISH to be honest, because they are violated so often:

1. ‘I’ before ‘E’, except after ‘C’.

2. Never start a sentence with a conjuction (i.e. And, because, but, or, also, so) – Honestly, the amount of times on this blog that I have violated this law… I should be put into prison!

And just in case you didn’t think the English language was complicated enough (SEE? I just broke law number 2!) :

CATS HAVE CLAWS AT THE END OF THEIR PAWS, COMMAS ARE A PAUSE AT THE END OF A CLAUSE.

The English Language, Ladies and Gentleman. Just try to understand and follow the rules I mentioned above (as in the ones where I was giving my explanation) and you’ll be alright.

As long as you don’t mess them up around me. Then we might have a problem. But with that, I bid you all adieu and goodnight.

14 thoughts on “A Few English Lessons”

Can you get off my blog please? Are these long comments really needed? Are you THAT unhappy with your ‘work’ that instead of ordering books and replying to emails, you leave comments on my posts? Literally go away.
p.s. If I’m at the V and A on Wednesday, I will avoid trying to run into you.
Queen ReRe out

No offense but this has gone from Grammar Natzi to English Natzi! You don’t want to talk to the whole world of blogging! We all abbreviate everything and don’t give a cat’s tail about commas unless there’re needed. I notice you don’t watch feedback so I’ll give you the only good compliment I have: You put lots of voice into this post. Good bye

No offence, but saying ‘no offence’ before you say something which you believe to be offensive doesn’t make it less offensive. (Personally, the only reason I find being called a Grammar Natzi or English Natzi offensive is that you spelt ‘Nazi’ incorrectly; other than that, I admitted that I am one, so your comment hardly troubles me)
I wasn’t writing it as a strict guide for the bloggers of WordPress, because (like I said) some of those rules are clearly broken. And if you noticed, (ooh look, see; I broke a rule!) I wasn’t talking about commas, I was talking about apostrophes, and I never once disagreed with or condemned abbreviation. I did however mention the confusion of the most often incorrect “THEIR”, “THERE” and “THEY’RE”, which you did not seem to fully grasp, seeing as I think what you MEANT to say was, “don’t give a cat’s tail about commas unless THEY’RE needed.” Maybe you should read the blog post again?
But yes, thank you for appreciating my voice. That’s sort of the whole point about my blog. Good bye. 🙂

I understand that you might be frustrated by the confidence of my response to your original comment; I assume you meant it as criticism. Unfortunately, I only really take into consideration ‘constructive’ criticism; constructive being the key word here. Perhaps you are trying to be noticed on WordPress, so here is a tip:
How about you try posting POSITIVE things on other people’s blogs and see if that works any wonders? It seems to have worked for me. Maybe positivity is key here. Or how about you offer criticism constructively? (If you don’t know what that means you can Google it) That way, the person is more likely to acknowledge your comment in a more positive light.
And – in the words of Jessie J – nobody’s perfect. 🙂

I am trying to get noticed but I only post positive comments on blogs that I feel positive about. Sorry but yours isn’t giving off that good vibe. Thanks and I understand that nobody is perfect. That goes for their English speaking too!

I don’t expect people to speak English perfectly; I DO, however, expect people to utilise the English language adequately, especially when English is their first language.
And LOL, I apologise that you don’t feel positively about my blog; each to their own, I suppose?
I never condemned anyone for their English speaking. You condemned me for my inability to accept poor English speaking by people who are supposed to be able to speak Standard English correctly – which, I think you’ll agree, is quite a reasonable intolerance.

Sorry for getting all fired up about your blog post. It just really annoyed me. I’m sorry that I can’t be truly positive about your blog. I guess we should be able to speak English since it is our first language

Well what exactly has my blog done to upset you LOL? I was unaware that it gave off negative vibes; I feel like it is an accurate reflection of myself and my personality… and I’m not a negative person.